


In A Cold Hot Air Balloon

by bonafidezombie



Category: Harvest Moon, 牧場物語2 | Harvest Moon 64
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-27
Updated: 2015-10-27
Packaged: 2018-04-28 11:16:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5088647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonafidezombie/pseuds/bonafidezombie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gray slowly comes to terms with the fact he's fallen for some city boy pretending he knows how to work a farm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In A Cold Hot Air Balloon

**Author's Note:**

> summary? more like fart noise of disbelief.

It had been three years. Three years since Jack came to town and started playing nice with everybody, two years since he overheard Ann talking to one of the other girl’s in town about Jack. One or two of them, apparently, had fallen head over heels for some city boy pretending he knew how to farm. He didn’t understand the appeal. So that made... one year since he started to understand. Barely a few seasons since he started to understand why Jack never responded the way girl’s hoped...  
  
And yet that left one thing Gray had trouble understanding: Why he felt so damned happy about that. At first, when Jack had rejected Popuri, it was easy to convince himself that he was happy he still had a shot with the pink haired goddess, but...  
  
Goddess, when she had shown interest in Gray, he wasn’t nearly as happy with the turn of events as he should have been. For the longest time, he had a crush on the flower queen herself and yet when presented with his chance, he turned her down. If you could call her surprised, there wasn’t a word strong enough to describe how Gray reacted to his own actions. He had always had plans for impressing Popuri, planting a little field of flowers in front of his family’s house had been one of the top ones, but yet when he bought the seeds, his thoughts instead turned to a boy who refused to turn his hat around the right way. A boy who, when Gray tried to make him wear it the right way, ducked from his hand and somehow made him blush with the sheer ridiculousness of his response: sticking his tongue out and telling him to catch him.  
  
What kind of childish nonsense was this? They both had work to do, Gray had to get back to the animals and Jack surely had better things to do with his time than this, but... Gray still found himself obliging to the silliest of things. Why of course, I’ll laze around with you on the farm. No, I don’t have anything better to do than this... even if I don’t understand why you have stairs to your roof. Yes, I’m plenty happy sitting up here.  
  
It wasn’t a lie, either. Even sitting next to Jack quietly felt nice. He appreciated that Jack never pressured him into talking, was okay with his silence. Jack was quiet too, but what words he did say usually brought a smile to his face. Generally, Jack didn’t notice the other thing it brought to his face, the blasted redness coating his cheeks.  
  
Sometimes his family would note he acted differently, more like his old self... not outgoing by any means, but at dinner he talked more and was even friendly towards Cliff. His father had taken to teasing him once over dinner, commenting that things must be going well with Popuri and joking that he might have to set another place at the table soon.  
  
When Ann replied, something about Gray having his eye on someone a little less girly, Gray had frozen.  
  
Where had she gotten that sort of idea? Why would she think he and Jack were... dating, or even close to it? It wasn’t until he forced himself back into the conversation that he realized that wasn’t what his sister had meant at all, but that wasn’t the only thing he had realized.  
It had been barely a season since that. Since he realized why finding out Jack was... wasn’t exactly interested in any of the local girls had pleased him so damn much, or why he had begun to understand why they looked at him like that.  
  
Goddess, he hoped he didn’t do that too... look at him with doe eyes like some sort of little girl. And he could only pray that if he did, no one had noticed. Especially not Jack.  
  
The next time he stopped by his... friend’s farm, he was quiet. Er, well... quieter than usually. Meaning near silent. This was awkward, no that wasn’t the right word. It was weird. Of him to act on an impulse like that, but he had already bought the damn sweets. No turning back now...  
  
Well, he could always just eat it himself, but... ick. His teeth hurt just thinking about it. Anyways, he knew sometimes the girls in town brought treats over to someone they were close to and... while Gray wasn’t at all feminine, he wasn’t sure how to let Jack know he was interested. Hell, he hadn’t even known how to do that with Popuri and that was supposed to be easy: getting a girl like her to notice him.  
  
Easy his ass. So he’d run with the treat idea, surely those ditzes knew what they were on about.  
  
Gray had barely arrived when Jack showed up, coming out of his field. Clearly he had been working, he hadn’t had to see him leave the field to know that. Freaking smelled like mud and dirt and he was left to wonder what he saw in him. Oh right, that was it. He wasn’t really one to judge, considering he’s smelled with work from working with horses through out the day. Not only did he practically show up from nowhere, the ever excitable male practically knocked him over when he reached him. Jack had bumped into Gray, somehow reaching up and turning the grump’s hat around backwards without him realizing it.  
  
“Don’t do that.” Gray’s remark was simple, almost curt. He didn’t mean for it to come off that way, but at this point in his life he might as well as been notorious for fucking up. When Jack started to apologize, laughing and teasing him for being in such a foul mood, Gray interrupted him, pushing the bag of cookies he had bought at the bakery into his chest. There was a moment of confused silence, which Gray finally filled with “I got them. For you.”  
  
“Oooooh.” Jack’s look of confusion was broken by a playful grin, hands grasping at the bag and already pulling it open. “Wasn’t sure if I should feel grateful or threatened, for a second there!” When Gray didn’t respond, Jack chose to continue on. After all, Gray did seem in a grumpy mood... even grumpier than usual, even. So maybe that wasn’t the best thing to say?  
  
“You’re lucky Elli is such a good baker, I might have to be upset otherwise.” Okay, not helping. Come on, Gray. You’ve been friends with city boy long enough to tell when he’s joking. Is now really the time to get all awkward on him?  
Apparently: Yes. Plan “Do something nice for Jack” was ending with his face bright red in embarrassment as he tried to work out of this was a positive reaction. And Jack was still carrying on about nothing at this point. Talking in turn about how good at baking Elli was and how hungry he had been before Gray had turned up. Damn it city-boy, shut up already! He had a question when he arrived, but now he was left ducking his head in a mixture of irritation and embarrassment, a hand raised to lower the bill of his hat.  
  
“Could you shut up for five seconds, City Boy?” Gray finally spoke up, anger edging into his usually neutral voice as he got tired of waiting for a chance to ask him. But then the silence he had just asked for hit him hard and he realized, he had gone a fucked up again. Slowly, he peeked out from underneath his hat and regretted it immediately... he looked so confused. Jack was hurt and it was his fault. Of course it was, this was just like trying to impress Popuri all over again.  
  
Except it hurt worse, messing this one up. If that was even possible. His free hand clenched into a fist and he hurried to leave, wordless as usual, leaving Jack to stare with his mouth agape in confusion.  
__________________________________________________________  
  
A few hours had passed since his colossal fuck up at Jack’s farm and now he found himself sitting in the barn, throwing a pity party of one for himself. Not like he had anyone else to feel sorry for him or that he deserved it. He was the one that had gone ahead and been harsh to someone that didn’t even deserve it. The breeze coming in through a crack in the wall had been pissing him off further one minute, but quickly enough he learned to be grateful for it. Twisting around slightly to press his ear to the crack and listen as he realized Jack had shown up at the ranch, for whatever damn reason, and was chatting away with Ann. Probably complaining about what a fool Gray had made of himself earlier, but...  
  
No? Jack was asking where he was. Why? Did he want to complain to his face about how rude he had been? No matter the reason, Gray had turned his back to the wall once again and tried to act casual as he heard the barn door creak open, his favorite city-boy coming in to... complain? Yell at him? Tell him how much he hated him?  
  
Well, Gray was sure he would find out soon. He kept his gaze downwards as his friend approached, staring at the approaching shoes instead of his face. He couldn’t dare look up, what if he was still upset? The feet stopped in front of him and for a minute, both males were silent.  
  
And then slowly, Jack had dropped to a crouch in front of him and reached out, holding Gray softly by the shoulders. It took Gray a moment to fully accept what he was saying, but Jack was... apologizing? He made it clear he wasn’t sure why Gray had been upset with him earlier, but... he was sorry for whatever he had done?  
  
And he kept apologizing too... enough that Gray couldn’t decide he wanted to laugh or throttle him.  
  
“You didn’t do anything, city-boy.” Gray finally snapped, but coughed hard and brushed one of Jack’s hands away from his arm. The pair fell silent again, Jack shaking his head  and settling down to the ground, sitting next to the grouch.  
  
“Then why’d you storm off like that?” Wow. Great question, Jack! He would love to know, himself, and would have to get back to you when he found the answer. He scratched the back of his neck momentarily, nervously. How the hell was his supposed to explain himself when he was confused too. Instead of answering, he went ahead and changed the subject.  
  
“... Meant to ask you something...” Goddess, stop mumbling. This is why people think you don’t like them: you don’t have a friendly bone in your body. With some gentle prompting, Gray finally brought up the sowing festival. And the hot air balloon, since he had been named king at because of that silly cake tradition. “Just was wondering... if you’d like to go up with me, tomorrow.” Jack scoffed, grinning.  
  
“That’s all? Of course I’d love to, the hot air balloon is a blast.” But, that didn’t clear up all of his confusion, though. “Why did you come over to ask, Gray? Couldn’t you have just offered at the festival, like the usual?” Did it really not strike him how nervous Gray was?   
Did he really not realize that Gray had managed to join a throng of female admirers? Nonetheless, Gray made no effort to explain himself. But in the silence hung another question and Jack found himself scoffing, scooting closer and elbowing him softly.  
  
“Whatever it is, out with it...” He paused, then smiled reassuringly. “You know you can ask me whatever you want, right?”  
 Yeah. Right, like the question Gray really had on his mind wouldn’t just send Jack the other way. Even opening that discussion was a bad idea. Just because Jack was interested in men didn’t mean he had to settle for some jerk who couldn’t hold a conversation. So when he opened his mouth and started to reply, Gray had to catch himself. Just... ask something else.  
  
“Stay?” A long pause “Here, please? A little longer?” Goddess, even that was awkward. That was it, white flag raised. He had officially given up into his ball of regrets. But... this was met with a fond smile and a snort?  
  
“Course, Gray. I’ll stay as long as you want...” The offer was slow and... Gray almost felt like it held more meaning than surface level, but... that was just him getting his hopes up. But still, with such an open ended offer, Gray had to bite his tongue to keep from asking him to stay forever.


End file.
